Your Workbench...

[TW1]

On my last workbench in NM, I Glued/Screwed a piece of 1/4" Masonite on top of the Particle board, then sealed the masonite. It worked great. I can't wait to build my new shop in Az, but the county will not issue a building permit for a shop until they have the house plans approved first.

 

[jwgary]

Masonite is the same thing as pegboard, except it doesn't have any holes in it. It makes a rather good working surface and that is what I plan on making my bench top out of. There are several plans here . The weekend bench is the one that I am planning on, with my own mods, of course. They show using a solid core door for the top, but I am having a hard time with finding one that isn't already painted, or mounted in a frame with a doorknob hole in it. I'll probably just rip down a 4x8 sheet of 3/4" plywood and use the double thickness as the base and cover it with masonite. Before I got my attic decked, I had some of the ripped down plywood sheets (so they would fit throught the attic door) in my garage that I sat across two sawhorses and it worked out to be a fairly good bench just like that. I'll also have an extra top if the first one wears out too if I don't find another use for the extra masonite down the road.

 

[rbattelle]

Here's a picture of what I ended up building. Overall size is 3' wide X 12' long x 39" high. Top is cheap 3/4" particle board with 3 THICK coats of polyurethane and aluminum channel running along the front edge.



There's nothing smaller than a 2x6 in the whole bench. The subframe is a simple 2x6 box with 2x6 studs spaced 12" on center plus 2 extras in the middle tight against the center 4x4 posts. I used liquid nails, two 3. 5" course drywall screws, and two 20-penny 4"-long nails at each end of the studs to secure them to the outer frame (used a whole pound of liquid nails!). The ends (not pictured) have 2x6 cross braces. Notice the back posts are 8' tall so I could hang a shelf on them.



The posts and cross braces are bolted to the bench using 1/2" hex bolts with fender washers and split locks. 4 bolts per post, except in the center posts, which only have 2 bolts. All 6 posts are notched so that the vertical load from the top is transmitted directly to the posts and not the bolts.



The welding blanket is not normally there - I just use it when I'm welding (obviously). On the right is an 8" Wilton vise (not the nice tradesman, the cheaper Chinese-made version) and a 3-ton arbor press.



Remarkably, the bare bench only weighs a couple hundred pounds. It's pretty sturdy. Cost me under $250 to build it.



[Sorry it looks small in the photo - had to stand WAY back to get it all in the shot]



-Ryan

 

[Joe G.]

I have two work benches. One is my "clean" work bench. It's for electronics and truck stuff that is not going to make a mess. The other is my "dirty" or heavy duty work bench for grinding, sawing, beating on metal, welding, or messy stuff. The clean one is 16' by 2'. The dirty one is about 7' by 3'.



Clean work bench.

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Dirty work bench

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[JohnRobinson]

nice bench

hi ryan , i see you and the ''77'' are getting along just fine

 

[rbattelle]

hi ryan , i see you and the ''77'' are getting along just fine

Thanks, John. But I don't quite follow you on the "77" part...



-Ryan

 

[JohnRobinson]

''77''

hi ryan - it goes back to 9-11-05 with the start of [circular saws -worm drive vs direct drive] your thread i ended up getting a bit flammed on that one.

but anyway you stated you made a purchase of a hd77 instead of the

milwacky ;i was all for it! - anyway all [skil] saws are ''77''s in the 7. 25 range

weather it be a 77 or a HD77 or a mag 77 or a super hd 77 . or maybe you

bought a craftman [rebadged] that was never disclosed. they are bacisily all the same . i just assumed you had a ''77''

BTW i aploud you for the ''notching''



hope this helps------- john

 

[BSkinner]

Mine's made so I can move it around. Made out of 1 1/2" angle and 3/4" plywood. I guess it needed to be bigger seeing how much junk is on it. The day this pic was taken it was doing bullet casting duty.

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Bob

 

[rbattelle]

hi ryan - it goes back to 9-11-05 with the start of [circular saws -worm drive vs direct drive] your thread i ended up getting a bit flammed on that one.

but anyway you stated you made a purchase of a hd77 instead of the

milwacky ;i was all for it! - anyway all [skil] saws are ''77''s in the 7. 25 range

weather it be a 77 or a HD77 or a mag 77 or a super hd 77 . or maybe you

bought a craftman [rebadged] that was never disclosed. they are bacisily all the same . i just assumed you had a ''77''

BTW i aploud you for the ''notching''



hope this helps------- john

OH! Okay, now I get it. Oh yea, I bought an HD77 Skil and I love it. One of my favorite tools.

 

[LesStallings]

I've been working on laying out my new shop and for the first time, I have a little space to work with.



I'm going away from the traditional workbench against the wall and designing two free standing work benches, one table height and one counter height. The center of the shop is home to the 4-post lift and has one work bench on either side. Drill press, band saw, hydraulic press, bead blasting booth, bench grinder, buffer, welding, etc. are all along the walls (near plug receptacles). I'm using two different sizes of plastic top folding tables to simulate the size and check out the work bench location for functionality and interferences. I also have a Sumner portable welding bench that I can use in the shop or wheel outside if the weather is nice.



I'm trying to put as much stuff as possible on wheels (including shelving) so I can rearrange as necessary and move things to clean up the shop. I try to avoid stacking things on the floor, as all the do is attach themselves permanently and collect dirt!

 

[GOLIATHGMC]

For the 2 years I was looking for my house, I had sooooooo many ideas in my head about the Bench I would build. After I moved in, I acquired 2 solid core doors from a friend whose father is a commercial builder. They are roughly 3'x7'x2", and have Masonite mounted to both sides. They also weigh in around 200Lbs. each. I built 2 identical benches, each with 36" high 4x4 corner posts, and the spars are all 2x6. Generous use of 3" deck screws & liquid nails made some pretty solid workspace.

 

[LesStallings]

Glue and screw! My kind of construction.

 

[RBrunson]

I found my bench top at a bargain lumber warehouse. It was a reject 2x4 glue lam beam about 20 ft long. I cut in two pieces for two benches. The one in the weld shop has a metal covering. You could fab one by stacking 2x4's and using liquid nails and 3-1/2" wood screws, you will have one very solid bench top.